Sunday, June 01, 2008

School's out! Nothing to do, at least for a week until camp starts. I got bored on Friday and went up to Prestigius to arrange my new room. Holy cow, "my new room." I'm gonna be a real teacher with real responsibility. Exciting! And very slightly anxiety-inducing.

Tomorrow I'm going back to Old Job to fill in for the day, and maybe a few more days this week. I just can't tear myself away from that unprofessional pit.

Saw Auric's band again this weekend, as they came to town for the second time this month. They played to a packed venue and played a rollicking show. I went with Friar, Maddening Angel, T-Bone, and his wife. They played a fantastic and very long set, but I was somewhat indifferent. For one reason and another, I didn't have any alcohol all night. Without its palliative influence, I couldn't stop wallowing in general pessimism.

The night ended, as so many do, at the Hangout. Friar, by this time really quite extraordinarily drunk, discovered that he could punch strangers in the arm and then stick his hand out and say "How are ya?" and they would invariably smile and shake and maybe pretend like they knew him. After several successful attempts, he started really laying on the punches, and I saw more than one frat boy reel from how hard he socked them in the shoulder. I thought for sure he'd be accosted by an iracund inebriated college kid at least once. But every single one took his hand and pretended to be his pal. Society has deeply ingrained its mores and regulations into us; a guy holds out a hand, and the other guy simply must take it. A guy punches some other guy, and the other guy has to act tough and not whine that it was too hard. Them's the rules.

I'm seeing a lot more movies now that I'm getting paid to sit around. I also have started watching the TV series "Lost." I know it's on the fourth season or thereabouts; I just started with the pilot and have so far seen four episodes. I'm behind the times television-wise, okay? Anyway, it's too soon to tell if it really is as good as everyone says, but it's certainly intriguing if nothing else. I didn't expect there would be giant invisible monsters. The writing is solid; it seems so far to be a show with a definite story to tell. But the writing also strikes me, as someone who reveres the gritty cable shows like "The Wire" and "Deadwood" and "The Shield" (and to a lesser extent, "Rescue Me"), that it's been dumbed down a tad for network TV. For example, the character Colonel Locke seems to have miraculously regained the use of his legs; this is made clear through a series of subtle hints, but then the show stops being clever and shows him in flashback seated in a wheelchair, as if this is some surprising reveal. I lost some respect for the script after that.